“Like” or Dislike
3rd March 2013
Gavin McInnes is, like, upset or something.
I don’t like foreigners learning English littered with the word “like” as if it were so much roadside garbage. I hate hearing old men use it, and I’m disappointed the word has made it all the way to Britain, but when my daughter uses it, that’s where I draw the line. I immediately called up a sign-maker in Oregon and had him make a sign for my house that says, “You Are Entering A ‘Like’-Free Zone.” He was taken aback by the request and said, “You live around a lot of Valley Girls or something?” I was so happy to hear someone say this. Finally, one human being who thinks it’s unusual to talk as if you’re a really stupid teenage girl on the phone with an even dumber teenage girl really late at night. “No,” I replied, “I live in New York City where EVERYONE says ‘like.’ Businessmen, moms, politicians, teachers, cops. It’s an epidemic.” It isn’t just New York—it’s the entire English-speaking world. People at airports, on trains, and in convention centers use the word at least half-a-dozen times per sentence and they don’t even know it. Do you? Am I the only one pulling my hair out because of this fucking word?
I think he’s kicking against the pricks, here.
The whole thing reeks of insecurity. I remember back in college when a student was asked a question, they’d answer in this neurotic interrogative tone that rose about four octaves at the end. “I’m not sure, but, like—” they’d begin an answer to a Wuthering Heights question, “—I guess, like, Heathcliff loved Catherine?” Those last three words would go high enough to shatter a wine glass. Then we got older and realized we were right about a lot more stuff than we thought, so we confidently said, “It’s a love story” in a monotone. Be brave. Say: “He said, ‘There’s no way we are going to get across the river.’” I realize you don’t have a transcription of what he said. It’s a given that you’re paraphrasing. You don’t need to qualify it with a big fat “like” at the beginning, you pussy.
Good luck with that.